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June 9, 2025 11 mins

Star of ‘And Then There Were None’ Nicholas Hammond popped into the studio for a chat. Did Agatha Christie inspire Mike White’s The White Lotus?  The ‘Mushroom Murder’ trial and the legacy of his roles in Lord of The Flies, The Sound of Music and Spiderman.

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Speaker 1 (00:00):
And then there were none. He's Honors His Majesty's Theater
until June twenty nine. Tickets are available through and then
there were none. Dot com dot au the Star of
and then there were none. As with us this morning,
Nicholas Hammond, good morning.

Speaker 2 (00:12):
Good morning? Is there good morning? Good one?

Speaker 1 (00:14):
Well, Agatha Christie didn't do a bad play, broy She's
something to a bad story.

Speaker 3 (00:19):
She knows her craft, that woman, and walking out on
that stage every night and saying her words.

Speaker 2 (00:25):
You think, by gosh, she knew.

Speaker 3 (00:27):
How to put a story together and all the pieces
of the jigsaw puzzle and make it all work.

Speaker 2 (00:32):
She really was.

Speaker 3 (00:34):
Well, she invented the genre, I mean, the whole genre
of the murder mystery. Yes, everyone else who's done one
since basically has just followed her format absolutely.

Speaker 4 (00:43):
Why wouldn't you don't mess with us?

Speaker 3 (00:44):
Not?

Speaker 5 (00:45):
You know, broke changed a bit, but not too much.

Speaker 2 (00:47):
Yeah, that's right.

Speaker 3 (00:48):
And you know, and a group of ten strangers on
an island and then something happens to them one by one.
I mean that's following today with white lotus and shows.
You know, there's still play still using Agatha's basic formula
for playwriting as you say, why mess.

Speaker 5 (01:06):
With it, it's like a secret recipe.

Speaker 1 (01:08):
Well, as you say, it is about ten strangers invited
to a remote island where they're accused of murder and
systematically killed off one by one.

Speaker 4 (01:14):
What is interesting to me is.

Speaker 1 (01:17):
Your career really took off when you were cast in
Lord of the Flies in nineteen sixty three. Another situation
of chaos on a remote island.

Speaker 4 (01:27):
It's come full circle.

Speaker 3 (01:29):
That's really interesting that you would say that it actually
is true. I mean, that hadn't occurred to me, but
it actually has thirty boys on an island and one
by one they start picking each other off. Yeah, you know,
and I guess that's what both William Golding and Agatha
Christie probably thought human beings when there is no responsibility.

Speaker 2 (01:49):
And there are no ripper cushions.

Speaker 3 (01:51):
You know, they can turn into pretty feral animals.

Speaker 5 (01:53):
Yeah, which is sounding too much like cruise ships at times.

Speaker 1 (01:57):
That's right, greatly, this is about the you know, the
fragility of human morality.

Speaker 2 (02:02):
That's right. I think that's right.

Speaker 3 (02:04):
And that's what this play essentially is about, is how
people can avoid taking responsibility for their own behavior, and
then when it's they're forced to confront it. You know,
what a devastating thing that can be. Exactly right, I
mean we're all backstage following the mushroom murder trial.

Speaker 2 (02:23):
Yes, that's right, you know, And is she isn't she?

Speaker 3 (02:27):
Is?

Speaker 2 (02:27):
She isn't she?

Speaker 3 (02:28):
And who's to say? But it's again, it's that fascinating dynamic.

Speaker 6 (02:32):
Especially with so much widespread coverage of that story. Nineteen
sixty three. When you think about that really early days,
that's the height of the Beatles' success and all that. Yeah,
I believe it's that long ago.

Speaker 2 (02:43):
I know, it's amazing to me.

Speaker 3 (02:44):
Well, in fact, and then when we did Sound of
Music in late sixty three, early sixty four, as you say,
I mean all the girls who played my sisters in
the film were just obsessed with the Beatles. In fact,
I think we all learned all the Beatles songs by
Osmo because riding to location every day in our little minivan,
that's what was sung in the minivan every single day.

Speaker 4 (03:08):
And I think the songs from the movie.

Speaker 2 (03:10):
No, no, no, it was more. It was more love lovely.

Speaker 4 (03:15):
And I must have done something good.

Speaker 1 (03:17):
Yeah, you said the Sound of Music, Let's let's get
to that. You were Friedrich von Trapped in my favorite
movie full Time, The Sound of Music.

Speaker 4 (03:27):
I will never hear a bad word about it. And
it turns sixty. I can't believe it.

Speaker 2 (03:31):
I know, I know.

Speaker 3 (03:33):
And I'm going to Salzburg for the sixtieth anniversary in October.
October twenty third is the actual day that it first
appeared in cinemas around the world. And so on October
twenty third there's a big gala at Salzburg. I'm the
guest of honor. And then there is the next night,
the Captain's Ball. Yes really, and so I'm practicing my

(03:53):
waltzing backstage every night. And yeah, I think it's going
to be great. And you know, it's interesting, Lisa, you
say it's your favorite film and you won't hear a
word against it, don't. The other person who world is
Hugh Grant.

Speaker 2 (04:06):
Oh, and you can.

Speaker 3 (04:07):
See there's there are a few YouTube clips of him getting
very stoppy with journalists because you know.

Speaker 4 (04:14):
Sometimes people like to sort of have a laugh about it.

Speaker 3 (04:17):
And he absolutely, you know, he says it's a perfect film.
There's not one frame in that movie that's wrong. It's
not He will defend it to the dances.

Speaker 1 (04:26):
Very particularly, it's very It's very close to my heart, Nicholas,
because my grandmother suffered terribly with agrophobia, didn't like to
leave the house, but she went to see the Sound
of Music.

Speaker 4 (04:40):
I think it was seven or eight times.

Speaker 1 (04:43):
As theater because it used to be a theater, a
picture theater, and as as us kids sort of grew up,
she would every time it came back on at the
cinema because it would sort of come, you know, and
go away and come back on. She would take whoever was,
you know, sort of like the age to go and
see it at the time. And so it's but I mean,
I would have loved it anyway. But yes, it has

(05:04):
a very special Yes, well.

Speaker 3 (05:05):
You know, I've heard stories like that all my life
which make it so gratifying to me, and I feel
so privileged to have been in something that did have
such a significance for so many people. I had a
lady come up to me in Chicago once and said
her husband was a soldier in Vietnam and when he

(05:26):
came back, he suffered terrible PTSD and was having very
severe suicidal thoughts, and she sat him down and played
the Sound of Music for him every day. For three
months and that got him out of it.

Speaker 5 (05:40):
Wow, it's out of music therapy.

Speaker 3 (05:42):
Yeah, well seriously, and you know, so everybody's got that story.
Not to mention. All my friends when they have toddlers,
they say it is the best babysitter in the world.
You put a three year old in front of that
DVD and there's twice.

Speaker 2 (05:55):
For three hours.

Speaker 1 (05:56):
Well, I'm glad that, sixty years down the track, you
still like to talk about it.

Speaker 2 (06:03):
Question.

Speaker 3 (06:04):
I'm so proud of having been a part of, just
a small part of something that made such a difference
to so many.

Speaker 2 (06:11):
Lives and still does.

Speaker 5 (06:13):
Ticket to that special event. I'm asking on behalf of
the friend.

Speaker 2 (06:17):
I'm sure we could do something.

Speaker 5 (06:19):
Sure, my Milt, Lisa, I.

Speaker 2 (06:22):
Know people who know people. If you come, we can
make it happen.

Speaker 1 (06:27):
About Spider Man. Another great film that you've.

Speaker 2 (06:31):
Made evolved in I did.

Speaker 3 (06:32):
I created the character of Peter Parker. He'd never been
done before. Is a live you know, as a human being.
There had been there had been animated verse of course,
so we were just flying blind.

Speaker 2 (06:43):
We didn't know what we were doing.

Speaker 3 (06:45):
And I did say to them, you know, when they
said will you do it? And I said, are you
sure I'm the one you want, because I assume they
wanted kind of an Arnold Schwarzenegger sort of person. I
didn't really know much about superheroes. And they said, no, no, no,
we want a real guy. We want someone where the
audience forgets he's got these superpowers and you're just get

(07:06):
engrossed in Peter's story of his own story, his own life,
and you know, a girl is interested in him, but
he can't get too close to her because he's not
allowed to let her know the secret, and you know, and.

Speaker 2 (07:17):
And how that would be. And I thought, well, that's
interesting that I think I can do.

Speaker 3 (07:21):
Absolutely So we did it and and it went well,
and it was the highest rated show in American television,
and it is now now it's a multi billion.

Speaker 5 (07:32):
That's so big.

Speaker 6 (07:32):
I mean, I told Lista this story, which is a
bit on a honeymoon. We ended up in New York
and the only show I've ever seen on Broadway was
The Spider Man Musical.

Speaker 5 (07:41):
But the influence just keeps running. What do you think
of Tom Holland days.

Speaker 3 (07:45):
Very I think, frankly, I think all three of them.
I think Toby did a good I think Andrew did.

Speaker 2 (07:51):
But I really think.

Speaker 3 (07:51):
Tom Holland, Well, I've had other people come up to
me and say, he's the closest to the one I did.
You know, he's the closest to just a guy.

Speaker 2 (08:00):
Yeah, you know.

Speaker 3 (08:00):
And I think it's a great performance. You know, I've
had all three of them. You know, you sort of
feel like you're all part of the you know, I'm
in the Sound of Music family, but I'm also in
the Spider Man.

Speaker 2 (08:11):
Family, and so there's that's not a bad couple of families.
And the and the Brady Bunch family.

Speaker 3 (08:18):
You know, of course, having having broken Marsha's nose, the football,
the one that broke her knows that well, dump dumpter
broken well.

Speaker 4 (08:32):
And now in the Agatha Christie family.

Speaker 3 (08:35):
So and now in the Agatha Christian family, which is
a great family to be in, it sure is. And
we have the most wonderful company of actors. I I
sit backstage every night just feeling grateful to be with
these people there. So we've got a few w a
people in the in the show, and the whole show.

Speaker 4 (08:55):
Got some great talent.

Speaker 2 (08:55):
Te Oh boy do you live? Oh, I know that
a very good school. I gave a talk at when
I was out here.

Speaker 3 (09:02):
Plus I was out here shooting a movie for Bruce
Beresford last September. We shot here in wa and in
fact we shot it at his Majesty's and and I
went and I spoke at at Woppa.

Speaker 4 (09:14):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (09:15):
Boy, it is a marvelous school.

Speaker 4 (09:17):
It sure is.

Speaker 3 (09:18):
Well, it's the only school in the country that really
has a serious music component to it. You know, there
are other good drama schools, but if you're interested in
musical theater or just in music in singing, yes, I
think why would you not.

Speaker 2 (09:33):
Go to Woppa if you were lucky enough to get in?

Speaker 3 (09:36):
Absolutely and you know some of the I mean, you know,
Hugh Jackman, for instance, is a good example. Back in
those days, kind of everyone thought, oh, if they're good,
they come out of Nither, they come.

Speaker 1 (09:47):
Out of and they come out of Nier and then
they go to Woppa. That's right, they come out great.

Speaker 3 (09:51):
That is exactly well Hugh in many ways he kind
of he kind of changed that thinking because I remember
seeing here mean, Beauty and the Beast when no one
knew who it was in Melbourne and everybody went, who
is that, you know, and that kind of.

Speaker 2 (10:08):
For the first time.

Speaker 3 (10:10):
He really put the school on the map nationally and internationally.

Speaker 6 (10:14):
Because I think he got plucked out just before graduating.
Too good for Corelli.

Speaker 3 (10:18):
Mind you, just one quick shout out for Nida Sarah Snook.

Speaker 1 (10:22):
Just one mat Yeah, just was she not playing all
those roles?

Speaker 3 (10:27):
Well, I know, but she was up against very very
stiff competition and very experienced Broadway stars.

Speaker 5 (10:33):
And a great result successions.

Speaker 2 (10:36):
Why isn't she great?

Speaker 5 (10:38):
Brilliant?

Speaker 4 (10:38):
Well, and then there were none.

Speaker 1 (10:41):
He's honored his Majesty's theater from now till June twenty
nine and as I said, tickets are available through and
then there were none.

Speaker 4 (10:47):
Dot com dot au.

Speaker 1 (10:48):
It's been an absolute joy to have you with a socamey.

Speaker 2 (10:53):
I hope you both come. Yeah, terrific.

Speaker 3 (10:55):
Absolutely I will and let me know when you're there.
And we could possibly have a small glass of something
festive afterwards.

Speaker 2 (11:03):
As my mother refers to something festive.

Speaker 3 (11:05):
My mother says, shall we have a glass of something festive?

Speaker 4 (11:08):
I'm always up for a glass of something festive.

Speaker 5 (11:10):
By the way, Nicholas, if you met Lisa, she's a
fam

Speaker 2 (11:14):
Thank you man, all right, thank you
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